Asia's tech news, weekly: January 16th 2024

Malaysia & Starlink, Taiwan & quantum, Huawei's no-Android OS, Thai PM's crypto handout, China's sea-launched sats, Vietnam-Japan smart-car cybersec, Q4 2023's critical technologies...

• Malaysia's MEASAT satellite solutions provider signs with SpaceX to become authorised Starlink reseller, with MEASAT currently serving 130 countries across Asia, Africa, Europe & Australia

• Taiwan: National Science & Tech Council announces goal of producing the nation's first quantum computer by 2027, meeting targets set in 2022's $258M quantum tech plan

• China: Digital yuan crime starts to emerge with theft of $1.4M in cash from more than 900 digital yuan accounts, simply using ATM machine CBDC functions

• Australia: Gov't assigns $22M in grant funding for 3 critical minerals research projects aiming to develop 'knowledge, technology and IP on critical mineral extraction and processing'

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"Millions of electric car batteries will retire in the next decade... By one estimate, more than 12M tons of lithium-ion batteries are expected to retire between now and 2030"

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• Taiwan Space Agency to launch incubation center in H2 2024 to attract and develop domestic and international space industry firms, leveraging Taiwan's manufacturing supply chains

• Thailand: $14.3BN digital wallet handout program to launch by May, funded by borrowing, to meet PM's election promise of distributing 10K baht to 50 million citizens

• China: On January 18th, Huawei is to unveil HarmonyOS NEXT operating system, reportedly now entirely detached from its Android roots

• Google to help with Humboldt undersea cable project between Chile and Sydney, linking South America with the Asia Pacific and boosting access to the global digital economy

PwC 2024 AI Business Predictions

• China: Orienspace's Gravity-1 rocket launches via mobile sea platform, delivering 3 satellites using launcher and propellant capable of more than double the previous heaviest

• Australia: Getmee education-tech firm gains funding $2.5M total with AI-driven English language coaching, building on white-label approach and international enterprize-level customers

• India: Tamil Nadu Semiconductor & Advanced Electronics Policy 2024 to allow chip design entities to be eligible for payroll reimbursement if they employ Tamil Nadu residents, in bid for TN as a manufacturing base

• Malaysia: PolicyStreet insurance-tech firm gains Labuan Financial Services Authority to establish Islamic finance-compliant Takaful and Retakaful operations

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"[Accenture AI] Studios across Australia, Argentina, Brazil, Greater China, India, Japan, Mexico, Philippines & Singapore will connect clients with data and experts from Accenture and ecosystem partners, ventures, and other strategic investments..."

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• Japan: Mitsubishi Heavy Industries-built satellite enters orbit primarily to gather national security intelligence, but with remit to also monitor the scope of major natural disasters

• Vietnam's VinCSS and Japan's VicOne, Trend Micro subsidiary, partnered on auto cybersecurity, focusing on vulnerabilities in smart car electronic control units as use of open-source software rises

• Singapore: Qashier launches a plug-and-play, WiFi- and SIM-enabled, QR payments terminal capable of real-time auditory alerts, focusing on SMEs

• Malaysia: Penang startup ecosystem gains recognition with Georgetown ranked 2nd behind Malaysian capital, and 8th in the whole of SE Asia

Singapore AI Strategy 2.0

• Japan's Marubeni conglomerate backs Italy's D-Orbit space logistics firm in $100M funding round to further develop in-orbit servicing, transport and debris cleaning

• Indonesia: Semaai agritech startup raised $4.7M Pre-A with full-stack agri-tech to help farmers and rural MSMEs boost earnings, in part with access to better financing, services and new markets

• Philippines: Survey suggests 9 in 10 Filipinos now use fintech apps in daily transactions

• Taiwan: Founder of ACE Exchange, one of Taiwan's largest crypto exchanges, arrested with 14 others on suspicion of fraud using false claims for speculative token listings

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'Rare earth magnet production looks set to advance in the US and Europe in 2024 with market participants outside of China seeking to secure and onshore the supply chain...'

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• Taiwan's Neuchips Inc, presenting at CES 2024, introducing Neuchips' scaleable AI 'accelerator' chips, built on TSMC's 7nm process and capable of 200 trillion operations per second

• Philippines: "...Chinese group known as Stately Taurus was blamed for an attack that had compromised a Philippine gov't agency earlier in 2023, coinciding with clashes...in the South China Sea..."

• South Korea: SparkLabs early-stage startup accelerator selects 4 firms for 22nd edition, working on AI-boosted manufacturing, carbon emissions, financial analysis and project management

• India: Mylapay fintech raises $550K seed funding with single platform for payments processing, incorporating API connectivity for both payment aggregators and banks

Critical technologies quarterly: Q4 2023

• South Korea: More than 550 SK tech firms and startups are exhibiting at CES 2024 in Las Vegas, working on batteries, semiconductors, augmented reality and more

• 16 Singaporean startups and 12 Singapore venture capital firms operating in the MENA region

• Cambodia: A podcast interview with the founder and editor of Cambodia Investment Review on the Rising Giants podcast

• Singapore: A brief intro to The MouthPad^ by Augmental, allowing people with disabilities to control and interact with devices by moving their head or tongue

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"Crypto and fintech groups were for the first time fined more for lax controls than the entire traditional financial system last year, as global authorities cracked down on illicit money flows..."

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• Hong Kong: Fund companies prepare to launch Virtual Asset Spot Exchange-Traded Funds in HK, in part to position as Asia's first and front-runner location for crypto activities

• South Korea's Coupang revives LG Rocket Delivery distribution partnership, with shared concerns over growing impacts of China's direct-purchase services seen as underpinning the decision

• Japan's Bellsystem24 and Taiwan's Intumit partner for generative AI-backed call center chatbots, looking to launch in Taiwan this year

EY: AI and India

• Australia: 11 universities selected to participate in Startup Year pilot, delivered via the Higher Education Loan Program with students able to access a STARTUP-HELP loan to support participation

• India: Google News Initiative Startup Labs rolls out latest cohort of 10 early-stage Indian news startups producing in English, Hindi, Malayalam, Kannada, and Telugu

• Solid-state batteries: "...'it will be extremely challenging' to mass-produce solid-state batteries to the same quality as current lithium-ion batteries, but if achieved, the tech will be 'globally unbeatable'"

• Australia: SparkLabs Cultiv8 agri-food tech accelerator opens applications for sixth cohort, seeking 10 solutions ranging from early-stage founders to growth-stage startups

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'With Japan facing a significant labor shortage on the horizon, many industries including the agricultural and manufacturing sectors are hoping robots will be a high-tech game changer'

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• Vietnam's VinCSS partnered South Korea's Autocrypt auto cybersecurity firm at CES 2024, looking to better protect smart vehicles from cyber threats

• Philippines: Sprout Solutions B2B software-as-a-service firm acquires PH operations of JustPayroll, a provider of enterprise-grade payroll solutions

• Taiwan: Numbers Protocol rolled out a blockchain content verification project aiming to ensure reliable and credible news for Taiwan's presidential election on January 13th

• "If cryptocurrencies are indeed currencies, and not speculative collectible fads like baseball cards or Beanie Babies, then they would be the world’s first traded currency with no economic purpose."

China & RISC-V chips

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Tech news beyond Asia & the Indo-Pacific:

» Kaspersky research uncovers iPhone system-on-a-chip vulnerability that allows attackers to bypass hardware-based memory protection, gaining full control over hijacked devices

» France's Tiamat sodium-ion battery tech startup gains €22M backing with plans for a 5 GWh Gigafactory in France, focused entirely on manufacturing sodium-ion battery cells

» Microsoft and US Dept of Energy lab used AI to create a material potentially able to reduce lithium use by 70%, with battery prototype taking months to produce instead of decades

» Intel steps to compete with Qualcomm, NVIDIA with coming launch of auto versions of latest AI-enabled chips, alongside acquiring Frances' Silicon Mobility for system-on-chip hard/software for EVs

» Starlink Mini Dish reportedly launching later this year, a portable unit small enough to fit into a backpack

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'...sophisticated AI tools and less robust prevention means that...the disinfo doomsday scenario — that a viral undetectable deepfake will have a catastrophic impact on the democratic process — is no longer merely theoretical'

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IndoPacific tech news: Other editions

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